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^,.v OBSERVATIONS 



THE REV. DR. GANNETT'S SERMON, 



UNTITLED 



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EEPUBLISHED FKOM THE EDITORIAL COLUMNS OK TBB 
BOSTON COURIER, 

OF JUNE 28th AND SOtd, AND JULY 6th, 1854. 



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BOSTON: 
REDDING AND COMPANY 

8 State Stkeet. 

1854. 



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,;. ». porrfiii it Co., pfjK'iKUs, 
i 3|>riog lian« and 150 Washlnston Stroet, Boston. 



OBSERYATIONS 



WHERE ARE WE GOING ? 

An admirable editorial article in the Journal of last Saturday^ on 
''The Military and the Citizens," may well be followed by some, 
reflections on the state of feeling towards the Union, now existing 
in Massachusetts among large classes of her citizens. We do not 
wish to deny, — we could not do so if we would, — that one of the 
late measures of Congress has produced this feeling. We did every- 
thing in our power to warn the country against the consequences of 
that measure, and to prevent its passage. Perhaps it is not even 
now too late to repair the wrong that has been done. But before 
the means by which this is to be done can be considered, we have 
to inquire soberly where our resentment against an unjust and un- 
wise act of legislation is carrying us, and whether it may not deprive 
us of all power to restore the compromise of 1820 to its true; 
position. 

The evidence exists all around us, that there is now a strong dis- 
position here in Massachusetts, to treat the government of the 
United States, at least in regard to one of its functions, as if it 
were a foreign power, whose authority over us we may and ought 
to bring to the test of actual resistance. We refer, of course, to the 
feeling existing in the matter of restoring fugitives from service to 
the states from which they come ; — and we say that this feeling 
amounts, in large classes of persons, to such a state of hostility 
towards the authority of the Union, as leads them to seek for pal- 
liations of their own and others' conduct, in a fancied analogy to the 
conduct of our fathers towards the government of George III. We 
have the evidences of this, not only in the acts and sentiments of the 



fanatics, whose head-quarters are to be found in a building from 
which dangerous missiles have been thrown upon the conservators of 
the peace, but we have it in the efforts made by presses not conduc- 
ted by fanatics, to excite bad passions against the citizen-soldiery, 
who have patriotically discharged a duty appropriate to their organ- 
ization, and required by laws which Ave ourselves have enacted. We 
have it in the numerous pulpits, which are now preaching the doc- 
trine that a moral question has arisen, of so deep and transcendant 
a character, that we are required by it to approach the alternative 
of a dissolution of the Union ; pulpits which inculcate the idea that 
the act of the government, in transferring a man by process of law, 
and on the clearest evidence, from the state of Massachusetts where 
he does not belong, to the state of Virginia where the Constitution 
of the country places him, is an act of the last degree of oppression 
and indignity to us, and to our moral sense, against the repetition of 
which Ave ought to protect ourselves, at every hazard and every 
cost. We have it in the proceedings of large public meetings, of 
which at least two have been held — one in this city, in Faneuil Hall, 
and one in New Bedford — at both of which open resistance to a law 
of the United States has been counselled ; and at the latter of which 
those who are the subjects of that law, have been advised to arm 
themselves and "shoot down" the officers of the government. 
Finally, we have it in the arguments and excuses with which a con- 
siderable part of the press is teeming, which represent our oppres- 
sions and indignities as the same in kind, and as fit to be encountered 
by the same means, as those wliich drove our lathers into revolution. 
But lest Ave should be supposed to have misrepresented the state 
©f things about us, we will cite a single specimen of the tone of the - 
pulpit ; and wc take it from a sermon preached by one of the ablest 
and best men among us, a man of sincere piety, and wholly free 
from fanaticism — the pastor of one of the most intelligent and cul- 
tivated congregations in this city — the Rev. Dr. Gannett. Thiji 
gentleman, without any excitement, but in language of deep feeling, 
eoberly and carefully measured, has put to his hearers and to the 
public^ what he allows to be the "fearful issue," of a dissolution of 
the Union — as an issue which "conscience and duty, self-respect 
and our holiest persuasions," call upon us to embrace, rather than 
have a laAv executed here, which requires the restitution of fugitiA'es 
from service coming to us from other states. We take the folloAving 
extract from his sermon : 



" Fourthly, we may proceed to rescue our own soil from being 
trampled by those whose attempts to reclaim their fugitive servants 
are conducted in a manner to wound our sensibilities and provoke 
our passions. I repeat, that while a law stands in force, we must 
either consent to its execution or bear the penalty of disobedience. 
But when the execution of that law not only inflicts a pang on our 
moral nature, but is made doubly painful by the frequency and zeal 
with which it is carried into effect, we cannot, or if we can, we 
ought not, to fold our arms and close our lips, in patient acquies- 
cence. The principle of the present fugitive slave law was embodied 
in the similar act of Congress passed more than half a century ago, 
but for more than fifty years the South was content that the act 
should remain comparatively inoperative ; let it take the same course 
now, and the North would acquiesce in the legal validity of a claim 
seldom enforced. But if the South evince a determination to put 
Northern feeling to a trial on this question, whenever it shall have 
an opportunity. Northern men will not consent to witness often 
such scenes as we were made to endure a few days since. The 
question will not be simply, whether a law shall be executed or be 
resisted : a deeper question will arise, when the Southern master 
shall use the free states as the ground on which to assert the im- 
maculate character of slavery. The alternative will then present 
itself, whether we will become ready participants in upholding a 
system which we abhor, or will seek a dissolution of the bond which 
holds us and the South together. This is sad language, and fearful. 
I know what it means, and what it suggests. But the facts which 
wring such language from us are sad and fearful. I have loved the 
Union as dearly, perhaps, as any one. I have clung to it as the 
guide and hope of the oppressed nations of the world. I have lost 
friends and been traduced, — that is no matter, except as it shows 
how I have spoken — because I maintained that the Union must be 
preserved at almost any cost. I say so now. But it may cost us 
too much. If "every manly, and honest, and Christian sentiment 
must be subjected to continual indignity, then will sober men, who 
have loved the Union and clung to it, ask whether a peaceable sepa- 
ration with all its prospective issues, would not be preferable. We 
do not want what has been justly styled " the characteristic of 
Southern civilization'" made familiar to our eyes, and we shall not 
be able. I think, to bear it. Not as threatening or braving the South 
do we so speak. We believe the Southern part of our country 



would suffer more than we from disunion. But the relative pros- 
perity of the two sections cannot be permitted to decide a question 
of such moral import as this. In sorrowful, not in passionate em- 
phasis we say, that if the South insist on making the North the 
scene of its activity in maintaining an institution from which the 
conscience and the heart of the North revolt, it will compel us to- 
ask in serious and solemn deliberation, is the Union worth preserv- 
ing on that condition? " 

We are, of course, all called upon to examine for ourselves the 
soundness and correctness of these and similar sentiments, now so 
much agitated. 

Most persons, we imagine, will find that they can best approach 
the solution of this, as well as of any other moral question, by 
sweeping away from it all false analogies and all impracticable 
courses of conduct, which only tend to shut out the truth. 

Proceeding in this way, we shall probably find that the sooner 
we get rid of the notion that there is any resemblance between our 
relations to the government of the United States, in this matter, and 
our former relations with our mother country, the more freely and 
truly will our moral perceptions be able to operate. In the first 
place, we were never represented in the body which passed the 
Stamp Act, or the Boston Port Bill, or the other obnoxious meas- 
ures that produced the Revolution ; they had the authority of law 
for us only just so far as they could be enforced by the executive, 
who was the common sovereign of that country and of this, wc deny- 
ing all the while that Parliament could legislate for the Colonies. 
Those measures, therefore, when sought to be enforced here, were 
acts of mere arbitrary power, and in no sense acts of legislation to 
which our express or implied assent could be said to have been 
given. But the obnoxious statute of which we are now complaining 
is a legislative act of a government which we helped to create, and 
in every branch of which we have been constantly and fully repre- 
sented. It is the act of our own government — of a government 
that is as absolutely and exactly ours, as the government of our 
separate state is. Whether our particular votes were or were not 
given to it cannot make it any the more or any the less binding 
upon us as a law, in the making of which we were represented. But 
it is of great significance that the thing which this law undertakes 
to do — the rendition of fugitives from service — was deliberately and 



golemnly stipulated and promised by us as a thing that should be 
done, in a Convention in which we were fully represented, and in 
which every one of our votes was given to it, when the instrument 
which constitutes the government was framed and signed. It is 
manifest, therefore, that when a moral question is raised, whether 
we should be justified in breaking not merely an implied promise, 
but a direct and actual promise made through our representatives 
in the Convention that framed the Constitution, that question can 
receive no aid from our former conduct in a case where we were 
never represented at all, and where no promise, either express or 
implied, was ever admitted by us to have been made. 

In the next place, we may as well disabuse ourselves of the 
notion of '• peaceable separation/' There is no such thing possible 
under the sun. The separation of these colonics from Great Britain 
was a possible thing, but it was not "peaceable." The separation 
of a state from this Union, is a moral and physical impossibility 
How is it to be done I Is the government of the United States to 
be expelled from our territory ; — its courts to be prohibited from 
sitting here ; its revenue not to be collected in our ports ; its mails 
to be stopped; its dock-yards and arsenals to be seized? If we 
could be mad enough to think of such a mad project, one week 
might produce occurrences, from the effects of which ages might be 
required to relieve us. But perhaps some earnest and conscientious 
person may have a dim idea that a state might separate from the 
Union, by consent. Such consent could not possibly be given. 
The United States could jiot tolerate the separate and independent 
existence of any state, at least on the Atlantic coast, and least of 
all in the case of Massachusetts. 

Probably, however, what Dr. Gannett means by " peaceable 
separation," is the division of the United States into a Northern and 
Southern confederacy, by mutual consent. To make this possible 
and to make it "peaceable," several things must concur, not one of 
which is in the smallest degree probable. In the first place, there 
must be a '•' North," on that question, and it must be a unit. Sup- 
pose the free states were assembled in convention to-day, and the 
naked question Mere put, '• will you surrender fugitive slaves, or 
will you dissolve the Union, break up the government, and take the 
consequences ?" How many of the free states would be found voting 
for the last alternative ? How many would not be found voting to 
yidherc to a stipulation, which they made with complete unanimity 



when the Constitution was formed 'I In the next place, in order to 
render such a " peaceable separation" possible, there must be con- 
ditions, not one of which would be likely to exist. There must be 
a possibility of living in peace side by side with the ncAV slave-hold- 
ing confederacy, without a treaty stipulation of the same purport. 
There must be a possibility of dividing the common property of the 
Union, upon fair,and equal,and satisfactory terms ; terms that would 
leave no chances for future bickerings, no opportunity for future 
strife. We have just seen an ecclesiastical body, that has been rent 
in twain by these sectional controversies, and now stands divided into 
a '' church North" and a " church South," obliged to resort to the 
final arbitrament of litigation, in order to make such a distribution 
of their common property. Does any man imagine that two sep*- 
srate nations could be placed in precisely the same situation, with- 
•out being obliged to resort to the dread arbitrament of the sword 1 
The two branches of that religious communion, once bound together 
by one of the strongest of all religious organizations, and by the ties 
■of the purest Christian love, separated with every " peaceable'" 
demonstration, every expression of mutual good will. In sorrow, 
not in anger, did they rupture their great and holy ties, woven by 
the master mind of Wesley, and held in his powerful grasp, until he 
could entrust them to hands scarcely less powerful, and to wisdom 
scarcely less unerring than his own. But once broken assunder, 
strife and litigation became for them as inevitable as death. There 
is no strife for kindred nations, but on the field of battle : there is 
no litigation for kindred nations, burning with a sense of mutual 
injuries, but at the cannon's mouth. 

But this is not all, nor chiefly the danger to be encountered. 
War — war of a terrible nature — between the several sections of the 
country — would not be the sole consequence of a dissolution of the 
Union. Whenever that dreadful event shall come, or rather before 
it can come, within every state of this Union — /tere, in this our 
beautiful Massachusetts — here, in this very city — brother must 
be arrayed against lirother, friend against friend, neighbor against 
neighbor, and blood, our own blood, must flow down our streets like 
the water that wasteth itself upon the pavement. Let any man look 
back upon the state of things that existed in South Carolina in the 
time of Nullification, and ask himself whether the Nullifiers could 
have proceeded another step towards the accomplishment of their 
purpose, not only without coming into collision with the forces of 



the United States, but without passing over the dead bodies of their 
own kindred, and friends, and neighbors. It is a historical fact, that 
the course of that insurrection was stayed, hy a distinct intimation 
to its leaders by some of the first citizens of Charleston — that their 
own lives stood between its further progress and the authority of the 
Union. Nay, let any man look around him upon the excitement 
now existing here : let him open his eyes to the feelings that have 
come into collision ; let him remember that the passion of loyalty is 
one of the strongest passions of the human breast ; let him note 
how many men there are in every one of our communities to whom 
the Union is what gives dignity and elevation to political existence 
— to whom the Constitution is the idol of their hopes and prayers — 
to whom the great name of " American" is all in all — to whom the 
flag of their country is a beacon for ever beaming upon them its 
refulgent glories : — and he will see that to pursue the idea 
of "peaceable separation," is to pursue a phantom that can 
only cheat him to destruction. Queen Victoria has not more 
subjects who would fling away their lives in defence of her throne 
or person, than this Union has citizens who would sacrifice life, and 
all that it embraces, before they would permit or witness its 
destruction. 

No ! if the clergy of New England will preach the dissolution of 
the Union, let them do it with their eyes open to all that it involves. 
Let them not delude themselves with the idea that a government 
Avhich has existed for seventy years, and has been constantly grow- 
ing stronger and stronger : — which has raised this country to a. 
degree of power and influence that nothing else could have enabled 
it to attain ; — that is wrought into the texture of all our social 
relations, our civil polity, our guaranties of prosperity and peace ; 
that stands the great, the sole protector of the institutions of the states 
against internal or external violence ; — let them not, we repeat, 
indulge the supremely extravagant idea, that such a government 
can be overthrown without more awful social convulsions than his- 
tory has ever yet recorded. 

So that, turn where we will, there is no avoiding the question 
which Dr. Gannett means to put to us, — with this single excep- 
tion, that the dissolution to which we must come, if we come to any, 
caimot be ^^ peaceable.''' The question then is, Avhether the ful- 
filment of the clause in the Constitution requiring the surrender of 
fugitives, is and ought to be so repugnant to our moral sense, so 



10 



clearly and unequivocally wrong, that we ought to relieve our- 
selves from it, at all hazards and at every cost, and not permit it to 
be done. 

This question we intend to discuss, soberly and cai-efully. ;jt no 
distant day. 

n. 
WHERE LIES THE TRUTH. 

The Rev. Dr. Gannett, to whose sermon -we referred last Wed- 
nesday, — and who is entitled to be heard to say such things, if any 
man is — has told us " that if the South insist on making the North 
the scene of its activity in maintaining an institution from which 
the conscience and the heart of the North revolt, it will compel us 
to ask in serious and solemn deliberation, is the Union worth pre- 
serving on that condition?" 

The Constitution of the United States. Art. IV. Sec. 2, No. 8, 
is as follows : — 

" No person held to service or labor in one state, under the laws 
thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or 
regulation therein^ be discharged from such service or labor, but 
shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service 
or labor may be due." 

It would scarcely seem possible that the exercise by the South of 
the right thus secured by the Constitution, is what Dr. Gannett 
means to describe as ' ' making the North the scene of its activity in 
maintaining'''' the institution of slavery. But it is even so; and 
the duty has devolved upon the press, of examining Dr. Gannett's 
positions, and ascertaining whether he has presented an issue which 
men of conscience are bound to embrace. We trust that w'c need 
not say that we entertain for Dr. Gannett the highest personal re- 
spect. We know him, as this whole community know him. to be a 
man of high ability and singular purity of purpose. But we think 
that he has overlooked some very important distinctions, the over- 
sight of which has led him to take a mistaken view of this subject, 
and to preach with a reference to a, dissolution of the Union. — 



11 



The question that he has raised, is a moral one. Its discussion is 
as clearly within the province of other men, as it is of his. 

We presume that all men, who are accustomed to reason on moral 
subjects, Avill admit that it is one important element in determining 
a question of duty, that we have promised to do or for])ear the thing 
expected of us. Certainly, that element does not decide the whole 
(juestion of right and Avrong ; — but it is as certainly to be taken 
into the account ; and if the promise was made with full opportu- 
nity to look at the subject in all its bearings, and to estimate all its 
moral relations, the promise becomes an exceedingly grave and im- 
portant element in the question of duty, whenever and wherever 
that question is raised. Now. in regard to this, the evidence is 
express and positive, that this clause in the Constitution was assent- 
ed to by all our delegates in the Convention for framing the Con- 
stitution, and that it was never objected to, when we ratified that 
instrument ; and that this provision was one of the chief considera- 
tions by means of which we obtained the surrender by the Southern 
states to the legislature of the Union, of the power to regulate 
commerce ; — a concession of the utmost importance to us and the 
whole North. Moreover, it is equally well authenticated, that at 
the very time when this clause was put into the Constitution by 
the Convention sitting at Philadelphia, our own Nathan Dane, of 
Beverly, in Congress then sitting at New York, put a precisely 
similar provision into the Ordinance for the government of the 
Northwestern Territory, in the same sentence in which he pro- 
vided that slavery should never exist there. This is pretty strong 
proof that when the people of Massachusetts made this stipulation 
in the Constitution, they considered that the act of surrendering 
fugitive slaves, by a people among whom slavery did not and could 
not exist, was an act morally fit to be performed. It shows, con- 
clusively, that when the promise in question was made, it was made 
by those who understood the moral relations of the whole subject, 
and who were under no delusion as to the moral character of the 
stipulation ; — for if there ever was a piece of human legislation 
framed with a careful, and conscientious, and enlightened regard to 
human rights and human duties, it was the great ordinance of 1877. 

The next element, as we conceive, for determinating the ques- 
tion of whether we ought to submit to the execution of this clause 
of the Constitution, is to consider what we are, individually, or as a 
people, called upon to do. when a. case arises under it. And here. 



12 



it is obvious, that with the exception of those of our citizens 
who have some official duty to perform in the matter, not a 
man among us needs to lift a finger. We have only to go 
about our own business, to leave the officers of tlie law to the 
unobstructed discharge of their duties, — and we have no res- 
ponsibility, not even of a moral kind, in the act that is done. 
The officers who do tlie act may incur a moral responsibility, 
and it is to be presumed that they are men fit to determine for 
themselves the nature and degree of that responsibility. At 
any rate, it will not do for other men to determine it for them. 
But as to all other citizens, it is impossible for them to create 
for tliemselves any responsibility for what is done, except bj 
the assertion of one or both of two grounds, which we will 
now examine ; we do so because we find them assumed in Dr. 
Gannett's sermon. 

Dr. Gannett seems to feel that there^ is some kind of dese- 
cration of our soil, in permitting a fugitive slave to be arrested 
upon, and removed from it. He speaks of our soil being 
" trampled by those whose attempts to reclaim their fugitive 
servants are conducted in a manner to wound our sensibilities 
and provoke our passions " — and he says, that we must " pro- 
ceed to rescue our soil " from being so trampled. 

Undoubtedly, our soil is consecrated to Freedom. But is it 
consecrated to Freedom for all 7ncnl What consecrates it to 
Freedom at all ? Is it not so consecrated by the Laio ? And 
is it not so consecrated just so far as the Law has impressed 
that character upon it, and no farther ? We presume that this 
will be admitted by all. The soil of Massachusetts is not con- 
secrated to Freedom by the general sentiments or feelings of 
its inhabitants ; — it is consecrated to Freedom by the Laws 
which they have ordained for its government, and just so far 
as those Laws determine the condition of those who are on it. 
But when we are looking for the Laws which determine the 
condition of persons upon our soil, it is obviously just as neces- 
sary to look to the Constitution of the United States, as it is 
to look to the Constitution of the state. The Federal Consti- 
tution is just as much the Law of Massachusetts as its own 
Constitution; it was enacted l)v the same authoritv, (so far as 



13 



we arc concerned,) and not an individual can hold any impor- 
tant office under the latter, without swearing to support the 
former. Moreover, the Constitution of the United States, so 
far as it speaks, upon this matter of the condition of persons 
found on our soil, as well as upon all other matters embra- 
ced in it, is paramount to all laws. It is impossible for the 
state to make a law which shall consecrate its soil to the Free- 
dom of men, who are made by the Constitution of the United 
States incapable of acquiring freedom by coming within our 
jurisdiction. In the same manner it would be impossible for 
us to make a law consecrating the soil of the state to the free- 
dom of men, whom the General Government has stipulated by 
treaty to deliver up to a foreign nation. 

The proposition is not true, therefore, that our soil is con- 
secrated to the freedom of all men. There are certain men 
who are excepted from this advantage by the operation of the 
fundamental and paramount law of the country, which deter- 
mines the character of our soil as to them ; and while this re- 
mains so, there can be no desecration of our soil by removing 
those persons from it. 

But Dr. Gannett seems also to feel that by permitting the exe- 
cution of this clause of the Constitution we lend some sanction 
to slavery. He speaks of " a deeper question" to arise, "when 
the Southern master shall use the free states as the ground on 
which to assert the immaculate character of slavery," and of 
our " becoming ready participants in upholding a system which 
we abhor;" and he presents to us the alternative of dis- 
solution. 

We must inquire, therefore, and we must do it calmly and 
solemnly, whether it is true that our soil is used as the ground 
on which " to assert the immaculate character of slavery," or 
is in danger of being so used ; and whether, by continuing to 
obey the Constitution, we do in fact become " participants in 
upholding the system." That slavery exists in the Southern 
states, Dr. Gannett does not deny. He says expressly that 
we cannot ignore its existence. He will probably not deny 
that it exists there by a law, or system of laws, over which we 
have no control, and for which we have no responsibility. One 



14 



■of the j)ei'Soud subject ti» those laws comes here, and the mas- 
ter comes to reclaim him. Does he ask us to admit the im- 
maculate character of the institution ? Does he require any 
thing of us, except the admission of the fact that by the law of 
his own state he is entitled to the services of the person whom 
he seeks? Does he expect us to admit that law to be 
righteous, just, or founded on the great principles of truth and 
humanity ? Ts it necessary for the assertion of his claim, that 
we should admit any thing, but the naked fact that the law of 
his state exists ? Tt seems to us that there is but one answei- 
to be given to these questions ; and that when Dr. (rannett 
speaks of the soutliern master asserting here " the immaculate 
character of slavery," he means nothing that can stand the 
test of examination, if he supposes the assertion to be one thai 
we arc obliged to admit, and do admit, when we permit the 
master to exercise the right of removal s<^cured to him by the 
Constitution. 

But it is always some help to the examination of a. position 
like this, to resort to cases of a similar character, and we 
therefore turn to a case to which Dr. Gannett's position ought 
to be applicable, if it is applicable to this c,ase. A treaty ex- 
ists with a foreign power, by which it is provided that fugi- 
tives charged with certain crimes, shall be given up. The for- 
eign government calls upon us to give up one of its subjects 
charged with the commission of one of those crimes, in the 
territory of that govt^rnment. The law which makes his act 
a crime, which defines the evidence, and the mode of trial, 
and affixes the punishment, is the law of that country, not of 
this. Are we called upon, when we are required to surrender 
that person, to admit anything whatevei-, respecting the jus- 
tice, reasonableness, or righteousness of that law ? Is its 
"immaculate character" asserted on our soil? It is plain 
that nothing is asserted, and nothing is admitted, but the facts 
that the law exists, and that th(^ individual in question, is the 
person who is amenable to it. 

Nor is it any more (Correct, to say, that when we made this 
stipulation in the Constitution, we " upheld the institution of 
slavery. '" or that we now uphold it, by submitting to what the 



15 



Ooustitution requires. The Constitution requires of us no 
activity whatever. The stipulation is not a promise to do 
something in favor of slavery ; it is a promise not to do some- 
thing against it. It is an engagement not to use our free soil, 
and our system of freedom, as the means by which to entice 
or draw away from service and labor, those who in another 
state, are held to such service or labor, by the law of that 
state. The language of the clause stands at tlie head of this 
article ; and the promise, or stipulation, contained in it, is . 
perfectly clear, and free from difficulty. It is a promise, not 
to be active, but to stand neutral ; not to uphold, but to for- 
bear to attack ; not to interfere for the purpose of sustaining, 
but to avoid all interference in the matter. And it is decisive 
of the correctness of this view, that it is the settled construc- 
tion of the words '^ shall be delivered up," that they impose 
upon the state no active duty which the State is obliged to 
perform, but that all active measures belong to the general 
government, if the state does not see fit to take any. 

There is, therefore, no question remaining, but the funda- 
mental one, whether the promise not to use our free territory, 
and free laws, as the means of interfering in the relation of 
master and slave, as it exists in another state, was a promise 
morally fit to have ])eeTi made, and morally fit to be per- 
formed. 

All soimd moralists, who have treated of such relations, are 
agreed that it is lawful, (we use the term in a moral sense,) 
for a nation or state, to exclude from its territory, any per- 
sons whom its well-being and happiness may require should be 
excluded. The right of a state to do this, is exactly co-ex- 
tensive with the right of a family. The head, or legislative 
authority of a family, may determine what persons shall be 
admitted as inmates under its roof, and may exclude any whom 
its happiness or welfare make it necessary to exclude. This 
right is perfect. The legislative authority of a family, is the 
sole judge of the occasions on which, and the extent to which, 
it shall be exercised. This right exists in a state ; and in the 
exercise of it, all states may and do determine for themselves, 
according to their own judgment, of what their internal wel- 



16 



fare requires, what persons shall be permitted to come from 
abroad, and dwell within their borders. Without this right, 
no state or nation could protect itself, or its people, from for- 
eign vice, or the infections of disease, or from foreign pauper- 
ism. The mere fact that this right springs from the great 
laws of self-defence and self-preservation, shows that it rests 
upon moral foundations that are entirely impregnable. 

[f, then, the right exists in a state, to prohibit the entrance] 
into its territory, of any class of persons whom its welfare 
may render it necessary to exclude, and the state is to deter- 
mine for itself, the occasions on which this right is to be exer- 
(iised, it follows that the state may use this right in any way, 
and for any purpose demanded by its real welfare. The right 
to exclude is perfect, and if the purposes for which it is used, 
are morally fit to be accomplished, the moral fitness of the 
whole transaction is perfect also. 

Xow, the situation of the state of Massachusetts, when the 
constitution of the United States was formed, was simply 
this : in the judgment of its people, it was necessary for their 
welfare and happiness, to " form a more perfect union " with 
the other states ; to establish a different and a better govern- 
ment than the one previously existing ; and to do this, for the 
attainment of the blessings which they foresaw would flow, 
and which we know Jtavc flowed, from the constitution of the 
United States. But in order to obtain this constitution, and 
these blessings, it was necessary for us to stipulate that we 
would not allow our own system of laws to become the means 
of drawing away those persons who are held to service and 
labor in the other states by their laws. In other words, it 
was necessary for us, in order to get the constitution and its 
benefits, to exercise our natural right of prohibiting those 
persons from coming and remaining here ; for it is historicall} 
certain, that without this and certain other provisions relating- 
to slavery, the constitution could not have been formed. This 
right we exercised. We entered into the stipulation; and 
that man, as it seems to us, must have his judgment singularly 
vearped, who is not able to see that it was morally right for 
us to do so. 



17 



Is the sitipulatiou, which it was morally right for us to make, 
now morally fit to be performed ? We are not discussing the 
details of the Fugitive Slave Law, or the question whether a 
commissioner or a jury should be employed to adjudicate the 
facts of these cases. Neither are we addressing men whose 
feelings have been so injured by the great Nebraska wrong, 
that they cannot now pause to consider a moral question. 
Neither are we inquiring into the binding force or finality of 
one Legislative Compromise or another. Behind all these 
things, as Dr. Gannett well says, there is " a deeper ques- 
tion," and we must all come down to it and grapple with it^ 
until we have solved it for ourselves, upon the immutable 
principles of truth and right. Is the promise which we made 
in the Constitution morally fit to be kept, or is it only fit to 
be broken? 

We will not inquire whether the alternative of a dissolution 
of the Union can help us to determine this question. Men 
may differ about the probable consequences of that event. 
Our own view of them has been sufficiently expressed. But 
whether our promise i-s morally fit to be kept may be thought 
to depend on other considerations. We have already stated 
what that promise is, and we have shown that by it we ob- 
tained advantages and blessings which it was morally right for 
us to obtain, and of which we have ever since been in posses- 
sion. This certainly does not weaken the force of its obliga- 
tion. But let us go one step further. 

Most of us believe slavery to be wrong. With the excep- 
tion, however, of a certain class among us, we do not venture 
to sit in absolute judgment upon the slaveholder, and to pro- 
nounce him certainly guilty of a sin in continuing to hold his 
slaves. Dr. Gannett does not do this. He shrinks from the 
presumption of such an absolute judgment upon his fellow 
Christians. Like most men among us, while he thinks the in- 
stitution both an evil and a wrong, he probably would admit 
it to be possible that the final Judge of all the earth may ac- 
quit the slaveholder of what we suppose to be wrong. We 
should not, therefore, think it right, apart from all questions of 
mere expediency, to fit out a ship from one of our ports and go 
2 



18 



and rescue a dozen slaves from a Virginia master. And 
why? Because, while we have our own opinions about the 
right and wrong of the institution, we know that we are not 
entitled to pronounce an absolute judgment, and to interfere 
in a case where tlie question lies between the slaveholder and 
his God. 

Have wo any better right to use our free Commonwealth, 
and its system of free laws, for the same purpose ? It is plain 
that in the relative situation of the free and the slave states 
of this Union — with the means of escape and transit that 
exist — if we were to abrogate, or refuse to abide by, the 
stipulation we have made, we should make our free soil and 
free institutions the means of just as direct and effectual an 
interference, as if we were to anchor a ship off the coast of 
Carolina, and give notice that all the slaves who could get on 
board should be free. 

The provision of tlic Constitution, therefore, wliich declares 
that slaves escaping hither shall not be free bij the operation 
of our lav^St presents to us exactly the means of avoiding all 
interference with the relation of master and slave existing in 
another state ; and its moral fitness cannot, as it seems to us, 
be denied or doubted by any person, except those who hold it 
to be a duty so to interfere. If we mean to interfere, and 
believe it right to do so, then we should diso1»ey the Constitu- 
tion, or seek its destruction. If we mean to wash our hands 
of all responsibility for or against the institution, the Consti- 
tution places us exactly where we ought to desire to stand. 

III. 

THE TRUTH MUST BE TOLD. 

In our issue of Friday last, we endeavored to show that the 
duty required of us ])y the Constitution of the United States, 
in the matter of surrendering fugitives from service, is nothing 
more than to remain neutral in respect to the institution of 
slavery, as it exists in the states where it is now established 
by law ; and that consequently our promise to remain neutral 



10 



ill no way commits us to the support or maintenance of the 
institution. We now propose to show that Dr. Crannett, in 
tlie sermon whicli he lias ])ul)lis]ied, has made some singular 
mistakes, which justice and truth require to Ijc corrected. 

In pointino; out to his liearers and tJie public tlie steps that 
we ought to take, Dr. Gannett says : " Fourthly, avc may pro- 
ceed to rescue our own soil from l)eing trampled by tliosc 
ivhose attemjits to reclaim their fugitive servants are conducted 
in a manlier to ivoui/d our sctisibilities and jn-ovoke our pas- 
sions J' 

Dr. Gannett does not tell us how he would have our soil 
'• rescued " from the foot of any citizen of the United States 
wlio has a legal right to ])e enforced here. While the Consti- 
tution of the United States exists, our territory must ))e open 
to the entrance of any citizen of another state who may wish 
to come here for a purpose made lawful by that Constitution. 
We have already endeavored to sliow that the particular pur- 
pose in question is not onl}^ lawful, but that when we made it 
lawful we did what was morally fit to be done. But Dr. 
Gannett asserts that this lawful purpose is pursued in '• a 
manner to wound our sensibilities and provoke our passions." 
Let us examine the justice of this assertion. 

If we have any sensibilities that are womided by the mere 
fact of taking a fugitive away, we are indebted for those sen- 
sibilities to what is in truth a wrong view of our duty, imless 
we mean to make it a matter of duty to use our free territory 
as the means of interfering in the relation of master and 
slave. If we will take the provision of the Constitution as it 
really is, and will see in it a stij)ulation not to use our terri- 
tory as the means of breaking up that relation wliich is estab- 
lished by the law of another state, our sensibilities will not 
be, and ouglit not to be, wounded. 

But again, is there any justice in charging upon those wlio 
have come here to reclaim a fugitive servant, a mode of pro- 
ceeding which " wounds our sensibilities and provokes our 
passions ? " Dr. Gannett refers to " such scenes as we wei-c 
made to endure a few days since," and he thinks we shall not 
be able to ]>ear a repetition of them. May God. in his infinite 



20 



mercy, spare us that repetition ! is a prayer that may well 
ifisiie from all oiu- hearts. But is there a shadow of justice in 
charging those scenes upon others ? If we are not greatly 
misinformed, a citizen of Virginia came here to pursue a legal 
right, and conducted himself in its pursuit without giving just 
cause of offence to us. He took out the process provided by 
law, and caused the arrest of the person who was the subject 
of that process. That person was in the custody of the offi- 
cers of the United States, in a part of a public building of 
which the United States are lessees, awaiting his trial. In 
the night, excited by men whose " sensibilities " and " pas- 
sions " we presume Dr. Gannett does not mean to excuse, a 
mob broke into the building, attempted a rescue, and murdered 
one of the lawful civil aids of the ofi&cer whose duty it Avas 
to liold the prisoner. Then, and not till then, was a military 
force of any kind called in for the protection of the officers 
and the authority of the United States. All that followed is 
well known ; and whatever may be thought of the conduct of 
our own civil authorities, or of the militia called out by them 
to keep the peace of the city, he who looks to " sensibilities '' 
and " passions " as the causejof those demonstrations, must 
/•eason very strangely, if he can charge the existence and 
activity of those sensibilities and passions to the individual 
who had invoked the process of tlie laAV in aid of a right se- 
cured to him by the Constitution. We have read a very dif- 
ferent view of these transactions in a sermon preached by 
another clergyman in a city not far distant — we mean the 
Rev. Dr. Peabody, of Portsmouth. New Hampshire. He said 
to his hearers : — 

" And now I have not introduced this subject here because 
it has excited your feelings and mine for the past week ; for 
it should rather be the office of the sanctuary and its ministers 
to allay agitation, to pour oil on troubled waters. This I 
would fain do now, so far as there has been bitterness or ani- 
mosity in our excitement. For feelings of this kind there is 
no ground. The processes of law, tliat have been unflinchingly 
carried througli, thonoli by i'earfiil instrumentalities, were be- 



4 i 



yond measure to be preferred to any possible mode of suc- 
cessful resistance. We have no reason to doubt that the 
functionaries that have aided in the work, (with perhaps a 
single exception,) did what they conceived to be their duty. — 
nay, I am not sure but that I ought to say, what was absolutely 
tlieir duty under the circumstances in ^diich, without their own 
seeking, they found themselves placed. I could not but attach 
great, if not conclusive weight to the reasoning of the United 
States Commissioner on this point; for, if under existing lawa 
such a momentous issue as the personal liberty of the innocent 
must be tried, it certainly is much better tliat the adjudication 
should be in the hands of a conscientious and humane man, 
tlian tliat it sliould be left to those who could administer the 
law without compunction or relenting. We have also to thank 
the firmness and prudence of the officers of justice, that the 
cause of freedom was not stained and disgraced by the un- 
])ridled licentiousness of murderous outrage." 

We have looked in vahi througli Dr. Gannett's sermon for 
a reasonal)lc ground on wliich to put the charge that any pro- 
ceedings, tliat have Ijcen had here, have been conducted in a 
manner that ought to have wounded our sensibilities or pro- 
voked our passions, so as to make it necessary to call out a mil- 
itary force. If he means to charge it upon the mode of trial 
required by the present law, we are ready to admit that if wo 
could have a different mode of trial for these cases, it would be 
more satisfactory to this community. But we are not ready to 
admit that tlie mode of trial furnishes any excuse for mobs, or for 
resisting tlic authority of law, or for killing the officers whose 
duty it is to execute process. We are not ready to admit 
that when the legislative authority of the country has seen fit 
to prescriljc a mode of proceeding, in a matter within its con- 
stitutional cognizance, it is for this community, or any other, 
to make that mode of proceeding an excuse for setting all law 
at defiance, and putting the officers of the law to deatli. ^e 
confess that we cannot see clearly into Dr. Gannett's mean- 
ing, although this is a matter on which every word that is ut- 
tered ought to ])e capable of no misconception. He says: — 



99 



" But when the execution of that law not only inflicts a pang- 
on our moral nature^ but is made doubly painful by tlie fre- 
quency and zeal with which it is carried into effect, we cannot,, 
or if we can, we ought not to fold our arms and close our lips 
in patient acquiescence. The principle of the present Fugi- 
tive Slave Law was embodied in the similar act of Congress 
passed more than lialf a century ago, but for more than fifty 
years the South was content that the act sliould remain com- 
paratively inoperative ; let it take the same course now, and 
the North would acquiesce in the legal validity of a claim sel- 
dom enforced. But if the South evince a determination to 
put northern feeling to a trial on this question whenever it 
shall have an opportunity, northern men Avill not consent to 
witness often sucli scenes as we were made to endure a few 
days since. The question will not be simply Avhether « fei^- 
shall be executed or resisted ; a deeper question will arise 
when the southern master shall use the free states as tlie- 
ground on which to assert the immaculate character of slavery. 
The alternative will then present itself, whether w6 will 1)e- 
come ready participants in upholding a system whicli we 
abhor, or will seek a dissolution of the l)ond which holds us 
and the South together." 

Does Dr. Gannett liere refer to the execution of this par- 
ticular statute, and the mode of surrendering a fugitive pro- 
vided by it, or does he refer to the surrender of fugitives at 
all, under any law whatever ? From the course of his remarks 
we are led to think that what, in his view, inflicts the pang on 
our moral nature, Avhat we ought not to submit to, and what 
must compel us to seek a dissolution of our bond, is the sur- 
render of tliesc fugitives at all, l)y any process. He clearly 
intimates that the whole right secured by the Constitution 
ought to be '* comparatively inoperative," and that unless it 
becomes so, we must seek a dissolution. If this is his mean- 
ing, then it is not the particular mode of proceeding, that 
ought to raise this transcendent and awful question, which he 
gays must come. But if this is not his meaning, if the present 
is wluit we ought not to acquiesce in, then we are quite 



I 



23 



sure that that dreadful question need not be raised, upon the 
mere details of process, method and form of trial. 

But Dr. Gannett intimates that the frequency with which a 
legally valid claim is asserted, may become a reason for our 
resorting- to the dread alternative of dissolution. What are to 
be the limits of our forbearance ? What number of instances 
of assertion of the claim, out of the Avhole number that may 
arise, will be consistent with the right, becoming " compara- 
tively inoperative ? " Surely, in a matter so sad and fearful 
as the ultimate remedy which Dr. Gannett more than alludes 
to, there ought to be some clear path of duty, something that 
conscience and reason can lay hold of, as a definite test of 
what is right, when we announce such an alternative. If that 
test is to be found in the apparent determination of the South 
to assert the right, '• whenever it shall have opportunity," 
liow are we to know that such a determination exists, or that 
every opportunity has been used ? We cannot think that we 
have yet begun to see such a determination, for there must 
have been a vast number of insta,nces within the last four 
years, in which the right might have been asserted, and in 
which it has not been. 

There is one statement made l)y Dr. Gannett which we 
ought doubtless to attribute to a less accurate acquaintance 
with the course of legislation and jurisprudence on this sub- 
ject, than it might have been desirable for him to have had. 
We refer to his statement that the present law is the same in 
principle with the one passed in 1793, and that the South was 
content that the former law should remain " comparatively 
inoperative " for more than fifty years. The inference from 
this is, that we owe tlie present law to some new activity on 
the part of the South, or some new determination to assert a 
right over which they had slumbered for fifty years. We be- 
lieve this to be an entire mistake. We owe the present fugi- 
tive slave law to the fact that the old law liad become ineffi- 
cient, and so far as lay in our power, we had made it inefficient 
by our own legislation. Other free States had done the same 
thing. The law of 1793, such as it was, was resorted to and 
constantly used, until this State, and many others of the free 



24 



StateS; saw fit to deprive it of its efficiency by prohibiting their 
magistrates from executing it. 

The act of 1793 authorized the claimant of a fugitive from 
service to arrest and take him before a District or Circuit 
Judge of the United States, or any magistrate of a city ^ county 
or town corporatem the State where he might be found, for the 
purpose of obtaining a certificate, on proof of the proper facts. 
So far was it from ])cing a law " comparatively inoperative," 
that down to the year 1 842 it was constantly resorted to ; so 
much so that in process of time its constitutional validity was 
.contested in the courts of three of the free states, (one of 
them being Massachusetts,) and in all of them its validity was 
affirmed. Mr. Justice Story, delivering the judgment of the 
Supreme Court of the United States in Prigg's case, in 1842, 
said of it — . 

" The same uniformity of acquiescence in the validity of the 
act of 1793, upon the other part of the subject-matter, that of 
fugitive slaves, has prevailed throughout the whole Union until 
a comparatively recent period. Nay, l)eing from its nature and 
character more readily susceptible of ])eing brought into con- 
troversy in courts of justice, than the former, [that relating to 
fugitives from justice,] and of enlisting in opposition to it the 
feelings and it may be the prejudices of some portions of the 
non-slaveholding states, it has naturally been brought under 
adjudication in several States of the Union, and particularly • 
in Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania ; and on all 
these occasions its validity has ))ccn affirmed." 

At lengtli the constitutional validity of tliis laAv became a 
question in the Supreme Court of the United States, in the 
case just quoted from, and a majority of the court decided, 
that so far as it undertook to confer authority upon state 
magistrates, it was valid, and that such nmgistrates might exer- 
cise the authority, unless prohibited by state legislation ; but 
that the states might constitutionally prohibit their magis- 
trate s|from^acting, if they saw fit. 



25 



Chief Justice Taney, who dissented from the views of a 
majority of the court on this point, (relative to the power of 
the States to prohibit their magistrates from acting) said — 

" Indeed, if the state authorities are absolved from all obli- 
gation to protect this right, and may stand l»y and see it vio- 
lated without an effort to defend it, the act of Congress of 
1793 scarcely deserves the name of a remedy. The state 
officers mentioned in the law are not bound to execute the 
dnties imposed npon them by Congress, unless they choose to 
do so, or are required to do so by a law of the state ; and the 
State Legislature has the power, if it thinks proper, to pro- 
hibit tliem. The act of 1793, therefore, must depend alto- 
gether for its execution upon the officers of the United State?? 
named in it. And tlic master must take the fugitive, after ho 
has seized him, before a judge of tlie District or Circuit Court, 
residing within the state, and exhilnt his proofs, and prociu'C 
from the judge his certificate of ownership, in order to obtain 
the protection in removing his property which this act of Con- 
gress professes to give. Now, in many of the states, there is 
but one district judge, and there are only nine states whicli 
have judges of the Supreme Court residing within them. The 
fugitive will frequently be found by his owner in a place very 
distant from the residence of either of these judges ; and 
would certainly be removed beyond his reach before a war- 
rant could be procured from the judge to arrest him, even if 
the act of Congress authorized such a warrant. But it doe^ 
not authorize the judge to issue a warrant to arrest the fugi- 
tive ; l)ut evidently relied on the state authorities to protect 
the owner in making Ids seizure. And it is only when tin; 
fugitive is arrested, and brought l)efore the judge, that he is 
directed to take the proof, and give the certificate of owner- 
ship. It is only necessary to state the provisions of this law, 
in order to show how ineffectual and delusive is the remedy 
provided by Congress, if state authority is for'oidden to come 
to its aid." 

A majority of the Court decided, as we have said, that the 
states could proliibit their magistrates from acting, if thej 



26 



saw iit ; but at the same time tliey decided that such action of 
state magistrates was consistent with the provisions of the 
Constitution of the United States. It is not important to con- 
sider here, the grounds of this decision, but our object merely 
is to show that the accurate prediction of the Chief Justice 
was at once fulfilled; and the law became practically inopera- 
tive after 1842. 

In March, 1843, the Legislature of Massachusetts passed a 
law, prohibiting their magistrates, under severe penalties of 
fine and imprisonment, from acting under the United States 
statute of '93. Other free states did the same thing. Although 
the Supreme Court of the United States had decided that 
state magistrates, if not prohibited by state laws, could con- 
stitutionally exercise the jurisdiction conferred, we chose to 
prohiljit our magistrates from doing it. One whole class of 
magistrates was thus stricken from the statute, leaving only 
the Circuit and District Judge of the United States in each 
state to execute it. The law thus l)ecanie virtually a dead 
letter in many of the larger states, which had thus withdrawn 
all aid from the right secured by the Constitution, and a new 
law of the United States became necessary, in order to supply 
a sufficient number of magistrates to execute the duty plainly 
implied in the Constitution. • 

It is not true, therefore, that the act of 1850 owes its exist- 
ence to any new activity of the South, in asserting a right 
over which they had sluml}ered for fifty years. It owes its 
existence to the unfriendly legislation of several of the free 
states ; — legislation which originated in an unwillingness to 
aid in enforcing the constitutional rights of the South. Before 
the act of 1850 was passed, Mr. Webster said in the Senate, 

*• And I desire to call tlie attention of all sober minded 
men, of all conscientious men, in the North, of all men 
who are not carried away by any fanatical idea, or by any 
false idea whatever, to their constitutional obligations. I 
put it to all the sober and sound minds at the North as a 
question of morals, and a question of conscience. What 
right have they, in their legislative capacity, or any other 



27 



capacity, to endeavor to get round this Constitution, to em- 
barrass the free exercise of tlie rights secured l^y tlie 
Constitution to the persons whose slaves escape from them ? 
None at all; none at all. Neither in the forum of con- 
science, nor before the face of the Constitution, are they 
justified, in my opinion. Of course it is a matter for 
their consideration. They probaljly, in the turmoil of 
the times, have not stopped to consider of this; they have 
followed what seemed to be the current of thought and of 
motives as the occasion arose, and they neglected to inves- 
tigate fully the real question, and to consider their consti- 
tutional ol)ligations ; as I am sure, if they did consider, they 
would fulfill them with alacrity. Tlierefore, I repeat, sir, 
that here is a ground of complaint against the North well 
founded, Avhicli ought to l)c removed, which it is now in the 
power of the diflFerent departments of this government to 
remove ; which calls for the enactment of proper laws au- 
thorizing the judicature of this government, in tlie several 
states, to do all that is necessary for the recapture of fu- 
gitive slaves, and for the restoration of them to those who 
claim them. Wherever I go, and wherever I speak on the 
subject, and when I speak here I desire to speak to the 
whole North. I say that the South has been injured in this 
respect, and has a right to complain; and the North has 
been too careless of what I think the Constitution peremp- 
torily and emphatically enjoins upon her as a duty." 

-fU though the act of 1850 contains much more stringent pro- 
visions than the act of 1793, on some points, it is not at all 
probable that any new law would have l)een deemed neces- 
sary, if the old one had not become almost useless, by the 
course of legislation above described. That legislation of 
tlie states we believe to be founded in wrong views of the 
moral relations of the whole subject. But an opposition 
was raised years ago against rendering any aid in the re- 
storation of fugitives, and the consequences of it have 
naturally followed. We are now in a position in which we 
are not ol)liged to render any aid. Do we mean to be 



28 



content with that exemption, or do we mean to go further 
and obstruct the govermnent of the United States, on whom 
we have cast tlie burthen? And if that government is not 
willing to he obstrncted in tlie discharge of its constitutional 
duties, do we mean to say that we must dissolve the Union ? 

We Avill add one word concerning our motive in making 
these remarks. It will be impossible for the people of Massa- 
chnsetts successfully to contend against the further addition of 
slave territory to the Union, if they arc untrue to tlicir plain 
and palpaljlc constitutional duties. We cannot carry with us the 
general sentiment of the country, we cannot carry with us the 
entire North, in any thing we ought to do or oppose, if we 
are to throw away our natural influence, by repudiating any 
part of tlie Constitution. We may make or unmake local 
parties ; we may call ourselves by this name or that ; 
but let it once be understood that we do not recognize 
the obligations imposed by a clear and precise provision 
of the Constitution, or that wc mean to tolerate the conduct 
of men who swear to support it with a mental reservation, 
and neither the cause of human freedom, nor any other cause, 
will ever owe any thing to our influence or exertions. 

We are now, as a state, and individually, entirely exonerated 
from all active interference in aid of this constitutional right 
of the South, when the exercise of the right is not olistructed 
or opposed. All tliat is asked of us is, that avc will not resist 
the authority of the United States, when executing their own 
laws. All our natural sympathies and all our natural wishes, 
in each case, that tlie individual may ])e released, if he can 
be la"\^^ully, will at all times find a sufficient and perfectly 
lawful expression through the efforts of the legal profession. 
No excitements, no public meetings, no mobs, are necessary 
to prompt the members of that profession to their duty. 
Probably there is not a city or town on this continent, where 
the most friendless l)eing in the world cannot have the aid 
of legal ability and astuteness, in any circumstances of dan- 
ger to his liberty or life. Certainly, there is no such city 
or town in Massachusetts. On the very day after the sur- 
render of Burns, a poor wretch of the same color, unable 



29 



to speak a word of English, was put on trial for his life, 
in the same court room. No crowds attended, no popular 
excitement created sympathy in his behalf, or furnished stim- 
ulus to his defenders. And yet there sat, day after day, with 
unwearied patience and unflagging zeal, two counsel; prol)- 
ably unpaid, certainly without popular applause, and gave to 
this miserable outcast all that talent and learning, imited 
with benevolence, could do for him. So it always has been, 
and so it always will be. 



54 W 





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